Pictures of You
by ariabellewrites
Summary: And Felicity couldn't help but wonder, how it had gotten this far, how they had somehow managed to get to a point where they could sit there together, on the floor of their daughter's room.


_**This is unedited, so I apologize for any mistakes, but I don't think there are too many. Just as a heads up, everything that is italicized is a flashback. Also, there is an appearance by Flash characters (Barry and Caitlin) but even if you don't know who they are, which you should since they were both on Arrow, it's not necessary to understand the story. If there any additional scenes you want to see whether between Oliver and Felicity, or with their daughter, I might pick a few to right, so let me know if there is anything you want to see!**_

"How weird is this?" Felicity whispered quietly as they sat against the hardwood floor, their backs against the wall, their knees pulled up, knocking against one another's.

Oliver looked at her incredulously as she shrugged, "I mean this is seriously weird, Oliver."

He laughed quietly as her head fell against his shoulder, "You're weird."

"The word weird sounds seriously weird coming out of your mouth." Felicity teased, "I mean it though, this is weird Oliver."

They both fell silent for a moment as Felicity looked around the room.

The crib was pushed diagonally against a corner, to the left of it was a set of double doors that opened to a balcony that overlooked the backyard of the house that was just big enough to satisfy Oliver and just small enough to make Felicity feel like she wasn't living in a museum.

There was chandelier made out of diamonds – because Oliver wouldn't settle for the fake kind – that hung over the crib, and the window on the other side of the bed made colors through the window reflect off the crystals.

Dimly lit lamps were on the walls, giving the lightly yellow painted walls a gentle look, a rocking chair was pushed against one wall, and a rocking horse was laid gently against another wall.

It was perfect, more than that it was everything Felicity envisioned.

"We're parents." Oliver said finally.

She looked up at him, not bothering to lift her head from his shoulder, as she blushed for some reason she couldn't explain, "I told you it was weird."

"We have a baby."

"We have a person." Felicity whispered, "Like a little, tiny, person who we have to take care of. Forever."

"We have a person." He repeated back, "What are we supposed to do with her?"

Felicity laughed loudly, and then laughed some more as Oliver quickly placed his hand around her mouth tightly, "Shhh."

"I mean it, Felicity." He said once she had calmed down, and laid down, her back on the floor, her knees bent, her head on his lap, "What are we supposed to do with a baby?"

"Feed her, change her, carry her around, parenting is easy." Felicity joked.

"Parenting would be a lot easier if she had a name besides 'baby Queen,' you know." He said seriously.

Felicity groaned as they fell back into the familiar argument.

_Felicity sighed as she held onto her shoes with one hand, and the railing of the staircase to the foundry with the other, as she carefully made her way down the stairs._

_Her stomach was slowly, but surely starting to resemble a basketball, and it was getting harder and harder to navigate the steps of the foundry that truth be told, couldn't be all that reliable after everything._

"_You know," John said as he wrapped an arm tightly around her waist just as she hit the middle of the staircase, "I thought Oliver told you to stop coming down here by yourself."_

"_You know," She said using the same tone as he had, "I thought that I had told Oliver that if he wanted to be a caveman, he would have to knock up a different girl. I don't listen to him."_

"_You do," He teased, "When he tells you what to do in a more persuasive manner."_

_Felicity blushed at the insinuation but didn't bother replying, partly because it was true, but mostly because she decided her attention was better served making sure that Oliver didn't have a reason to lecture her on why she shouldn't be walking down the stairs alone._

_She grinned to herself, even seven months in, and she could make it down the staircase herself, sort of anyway._

_She nearly laughed at the kinds of things she considered achievements these days, she prided herself on not throwing up in the morning greatly. Apparently, Baby Queen was a ridiculously picky eater, though she seemed to have a certain taste for pineapple._

"_I told you to stop walking down the stairs yourself." Oliver said as a form of greeting when he emerged from the showers in the foundry, an addition that occurred when Oliver had started living in it, to find Felicity sitting at her computers._

"_How do you know I came down by myself?" Felicity cried before turning her chair to give John an accusing look, "Traitor."_

"_Actually, I didn't," He teased walking over and placing a kiss on her head, "But you just ratted yourself out."_

_Felicity squinted her eyes at him, before pointing a finger at him, "If you use that move on Baby Queen-"_

"_You'll what?" He raised his eyebrows._

"_Either kiss you, or kick you." She shrugged waving her hand, "Depends on the situation."_

"_It doesn't matter, because Baby Queen is going to be the most well-behaved baby ever. After all, she's our daughter."_

_Felicity laughed like that was the best joke Oliver had ever told, though she was sure it wasn't._

_She loved this version of him, not that she hadn't loved Oliver when he was dark and damaged – because even that version of Oliver was someone she was willing to spend her entire life with – but there was no competing with this version of him._

_There were days when he was still dark, days when he was still damaged, but there were also days when Felicity caught the version of him that he used to be before he got onto that boat – or at least a less asshole-like version of him._

_He was funny, and quick to laugh, and above all incredibly charming._

"_Speaking of," Thea – who had been sparring with Roy up till that point – threw in, "Are you ever going to name my niece anything besides Baby Queen, because if you actually name her 'Baby' I will never admit to anyone that I'm related to her."_

"_She kind of has a point." John added._

"_Shut up," Felicity rounded on him, "When Sara died it was basically like the universe was telling you your daughter's name is Sara, you got lucky. Not that I wanted Sara to die, because she was my friend, she was my only girl friend, and she was such a badass with that bow staff, and-"_

"_The point is," Oliver cut her off before she could dig herself a bigger hole, "Baby Queen's name isn't going to be 'Baby,' she's going to have a name, eventually."_

_The subject was dropped for the moment when Laurel walked in, even two years later, Felicity wasn't quite sure they were friends, she supposed they had to be considering the things that had lived through together, but it wasn't like it was with Sara, though that probably had something to do with the wistful looks she sometimes shot Oliver when he wasn't paying attention._

_Felicity tried not to let that bother her, she was with Oliver, not Laurel, but some history was too hard to fight._

_However, the subject was only dropped for the moment, as soon as they were out of the foundry, and walking towards Felicity's car – whose keys Oliver had monopolized, because god forbid she drive while she was pregnant – it was brought up again._

"_We could name her Moira." Felicity said quietly, as his fingers laced through her own, it was an idea she had been toying with for a couple of weeks, "After your mom."_

_Oliver was quiet for a long moment, as he stared ahead, giving her no idea of what he was thinking, before he finally shook his head, "It's taken me a long time to be okay with us, Felicity. Not with having a baby with you, but by giving a kid a life with me as their dad, and now I'm okay with it. I think I'm even happy about it. But I can't move backwards, not with our daughter, not with our family. I can't move backwards."_

"_Okay," She nodded softly squeezing his hand, "Then we'll wait, we'll wait for the universe to tell us what her name is, and we'll move forward."_

"I'm just saying that we can't call her 'Baby Queen' till she's four if that's when the universe tells us her name, because we've been calling her that for the past three days."

"Fine," Felicity conceded slightly, "If the universe doesn't tell us Baby Queen's name by the end of the week, we'll just a pick name from a hat or something."

"Perfect," He said dryly, "We'll pick our daughter's name the same way we decided what to have for dinner last night."

"Well it's not my fault you permanently ruined Big Belly Burger for me." Felicity defended herself, though her attempt at a joke made Oliver's face grow solemn.

"Did I ever apologize to you for that night?"

"More times than I can count." She said softly placing her hand on his face, "It's okay, Oliver. Stop beating yourself up over it."

"You deserved better than that."

_Felicity paced around her living room nervously as she waited for Oliver to come back to the foundry with their food, she wasn't sure how exactly she was supposed to tell him what she needed to tell him, but she had been going crazy over it._

_She had kept the knowledge to herself for the past week, Oliver already knew something was up with her, and she was going to explode and say it at a completely terrible time if she didn't just get the words out of her mouth._

_Logically, she knew that this was going to happen eventually. But they were supposed to have more time, it was supposed to be planned, she was supposed to be ready for it, but more than that Oliver was supposed to be ready for it._

_God, they had only really been together for a year, not to mention they had never had a conversation about kids, something looking back on, would have been really nice to have done before Felicity had gone and gotten herself accidentally knocked up._

"_Hey," Oliver smiled as he opened the door causing her to freeze in her tracks, "I got dinner."_

"_I have a thing." Felicity blurted out quickly._

"_Okay," He said slowly as he closed the door, "Am I supposed to know what that means?"_

"_No, yes, I don't know," She shrugged, "It's just I have this thing that has this potential to be a thing, and I know you're probably going to freak out, because I'm freaking out about this thing, except I don't want it to be a thing, I want to be happy, and excited about it, because this thing could be really good, and amazing, if we let it, because this thing is going to happen anyways, so we might as well be happy. Right?"_

_Oliver blinked at her for a moment, as if he trying to process that before opening his mouth, shutting it, and then opening it again, "Could I get that in English please?"_

"_I'm pregnant." Felicity blurted before amending the statement, "We're pregnant."_

_Felicity watched, biting the inside of her bottom lip, as Oliver's face grew surprised, and then angry, and the almost fearful, and then it turned into an expression that she had long since recognized as Oliver shutting down._

_It was cold, indifferent, it was a machine, and it was exactly what Felicity had been hoping wasn't going to happen._

_He walked across the room slowly, placed the food on her coffee table, and then turned on his heel, and walked right out of her apartment, slamming the door behind him._

"Where did you go that night?" Felicity asked, she had been wondering that for a while now.

"Honestly?"

"It would be appreciated."

"I went to Sara's grave."

Felicity closed her eyes, not out of jealousy, but of sadness. She had known, she had known from the moment she had laid eyes on Sara Lance, that Felicity would always share Oliver with her. Laurel, was someone Felicity would never share with Oliver, she was someone he hadn't loved like that in a long time, but Sara – well a part of him was always going to love Sara.

And she was okay with that.

She hadn't been with him on that island, she hadn't seen the things they had seen together, she hadn't been through the things they had been through together, and the Oliver that had lived through all those things, that part of him would always love Sara, they had fought too hard to keep each other alive not too.

The part that she got, the part that loved her, was the part that he was now. And what more could she want than that?

She just wished Sara was still there, with them.

"Did she give you the answers you were looking for?" Felicity asked even though she already knew the answer.

"Of course she did."

"_I know something's going on between you two." Thea said quietly as they watched Roy and Oliver – who had been avoiding her like she had some kind of contagious disease – spar, "And I'm not going to pry, because he's my big brother, and you're my big sister, and I don't want to choose sides, but I'm here, as a neutral person, but I'm here. If you need anything."_

_Felicity turned to look at Thea – whose gaze was fixated on Roy and Oliver – for a long moment. _

_It was funny to think that five years ago, Felicity had just thought of Thea as Oliver's kid sister who had a knack for finding herself in life-threatening decisions, and now, they were sisters, whether she was Oliver's girlfriend or not, they were sisters in every sense of the word that mattered._

"_I know. But we're going to be okay." Felicity said hoping that if she said it out loud, than maybe, just maybe it would be true, "We always are."_

"_Okay isn't the same as happy."_

"_I'm guessing you still haven't given in to Roy." _

_Thea laughed dryly, "I know the truth now, all of it, and I can take care of myself, but I just can't shake the feeling that if I let him back in, I'll just turn into the girl who wanted to run away with a guy who couldn't even be honest with her, and I can't be that girl again."_

"_So don't be." She said simply._

_They fell into silence for a moment, with the exception of Oliver and Roy's sparring, and Oliver's phone ringing incessantly against the counter._

"_Hey Ollie!" Thea called loudly once they had both had enough of it, "Pick up your damn phone, it's Queen Consolidated. You have people in your life that don't wear a mask, you know!"_

_Oliver dropped the bow staff as he looked at Thea like he had just been doused with cold water, "What did you just say?"_

"_Pick up your phone."_

"_No after that."_

"_I said," Thea exaggerated the word, "You have people in your life that don't wear a mask."_

_Oliver stared at her for another long moment, before picking up the bow staff again._

_Felicity frowned as she watched, she had never seen Roy even get this halfway near this close to beating Oliver before, he was distracted, by something other than the fact that she was currently an incubator._

"_This is pathetic." Thea muttered as she stalked over and grabbed the staff out of Oliver's hand effectively benching him._

_What Felicity hadn't been expecting was what came next._

_Oliver stalked over to her, like it was his idea to quit sparring in the first place, and then placed two rough hands on either side of her face, and kissed her so deeply, that her back arched, and she found herself having to stand up from the chair she was sitting on._

"_What was that for?" She breathed when he finally pulled away._

"_Someone once told me that we aren't our masks, and we need people in our lives that don't wear one."_

"_What does that mean?" She asked confused about how that was relevant to the fact that he had kissed her like he would never be able to do so again._

_For a second, she felt a deep sense of dread as she wondered if he was leaving her, if he was going to make her do this alone._

"_It means that I want more out of my life too. It means that I don't want to die down here. It means that for once I'm actually going to do something about that."_

"_You mean…." She trailed off not wanting to get her hopes up._

"_I mean I'm in," He nodded, "We're going to have a baby, and I'm all in."_

Felicity turned her head to the side as a soft cry echoed from the crib, looked back at Oliver, and then forced herself to sit up.

"I'll get her." She said not bothering to lower her voice anymore now that the baby was up, there was no point, as she walked across the length of the room, and gently reached down into the crib, and picked up her daughter, "Hi baby, hi. What's wrong with you, huh? I just fed you, and changed you. So I don't know what you've got to be complaining about. I mean besides the fact that you don't have a name, but I doubt you've even noticed you don't have a name, you're too care about that, not that that gives you a free pass to be vain, Baby Queen."

She was beautiful, most babies were ugly when they were born, Felicity was a firm believer in that, but maybe because her daughter had been blessed with an insanely beautiful face, or maybe it was because her opinion was biased, or maybe it was little bit of both, either way, she was the prettiest baby Felicity had ever seen.

She had Oliver's blonde hair – Felicity would've loved to say it was hers, but she wasn't a natural blonde – and green eyes that reminded her of the beauty of the forests on Lian Yu – no one was sure where she had gotten her eyes from – and small nose that Felicity was constantly resisting the urge to kiss.

"Oh I know what you want." Felicity teased as she dropped to her knees next to Oliver, gently handing the baby off to him, "You just want your daddy."

And it was true, Baby Queen had been a daddy's girl from the moment she was born, and Felicity couldn't even be envious of it because there was something in the way that Oliver looked at her.

Like she healed all the pain that he had ever been through, like she made him forget it, like she was the sunshine that had finally broken through all the clouds in his world, Felicity had managed to make Oliver want to heal, but their daughter, she was the one who had done the actual healing.

"I guess we could keep her." Oliver said quietly as he stared at her tiny face with an expression almost identical to the one she was staring back at him with.

"I think we like her." Felicity agreed then paused, "What about Skye?"

Oliver considered it for a moment before shaking his head, "No."

She had been expecting that, so she wasn't too frustrated with his refusal, she wasn't even too sure about the name Skye, she really just didn't want to pick their baby's name out of a hat.

She wanted her name to mean something as much as Oliver did.

She needed a stronger name than Skye. Neither Oliver nor Felicity were under any illusions, their daughter was going to have to be a fighter, she was born in a world, born in a life, born to parents, where there was no possible way she could be anything different.

Trouble would most likely follow her wherever she went, no matter how hard Oliver and Felicity fought to protect her from it, it was in her ingrained in her DNA.

"I didn't think it would be like this." Oliver said quietly, "Her, I mean, you. I didn't expect peace, I'm still trying to figure out where both of you came from."

Felicity was quiet for a second as she searched for the right words to say to that, because the words Oliver had just said meant so much more than she would ever been able to explain.

"Grace." She said finally.

"Grace?" Oliver looked up at her.

"That could be her middle name, I mean she's our grace isn't she?"

Oliver looked at the baby for a long moment before looking back up at her, "Hope."

"Hope?"

Oliver gave her a smile, a sweet, gentle smile that she felt the warmth of in her bones, "You're my grace, Felicity. She's our hope."

She leaned over, kissing him slowly, relearning how his lips felt on her own, "Hope."

"_How long are you going to hide out here for?" Caitlin asked quietly as they laid on their backs in the living room of the small home, both of them laying in opposite directions, but their heads side by side._

"_Is that your polite way of kicking me out?"_

"_No." Caitlin said ruefully, "If I wanted you to go, I wouldn't feel the need to be polite about it."_

"_Okay, you," Barry said seemingly coming out of nowhere, like he had a way of doing, "Need to work on your nice skills. And you, need to stop wallowing in self-pity."_

"_I am not wallowing." Felicity said affronted as he grabbed her arm, and hoisted her up onto her two feet, before forcing Caitlin to do the same._

"_Yes you are," Barry rolled his eyes, "You screwed up a mission, then Oliver screwed one up, then you yelled, and he yelled, and now you're wallowing. Get over it, he likes to yell. Even I know that."_

_Felicity glared at Barry, she had come to Central City to stay with Barry and Caitlin because they were supposed to be on her side not Oliver's, except Barry and Oliver had to go form their stupid hero Scooby-Doo gang, and now Barry was basically verbally kicking her ass._

"_You know I think I liked you better when you were all awkward and unconfident."_

"_I did too." Caitlin offered._

"_Please," Barry grinned, "You don't even like me now."_

"_That is true." She replied indifferently, though the teasing warmth in her eyes couldn't be missed._

_Felicity felt a pang of sadness hit her, she hated that she couldn't have that with Oliver. She understood that Oliver's past was a lot darker than Barry's, but if he and Caitlin could have a happy ending, why the hell couldn't she and Oliver?_

_She hated it._

_And she hated him._

_She hated how much she loved him, she hated how much she waited, hoping, for him to just look at her, to smile at her, to say something that would leave a goofy grin on her face for days afterward._

_She hated how pathetic he made her._

_It was what had driven her to go to Central City. She had been fighting with Oliver for what felt like months now, she loved him, and he loved her, that part was over, but he just couldn't get his head out of his ass long enough to understand that she didn't care if their first and only date got bombed._

_She was in danger every damn time she walked into the foundry, she was probably in less danger the more time she spent with Oliver, and not the other way around._

_Not to mention it was her life, and it seriously pissed her off, that he thought he could dictate how and when she was the safest._

_So she had gone to Central City. Her feelings for Barry had long since gone away, leaving her with an incredible friend, as had her feelings for Ray, because for some reason she couldn't get rid of Oliver the way she got rid of everything else. _

_At least in Central City she had friends, actual friends, over time Barry, Caitlin, and Cisco had become three very important people in her life, and neither Caitlin nor Cisco had any loyalty to Oliver so they felt no need to defend him when she angrily called him a 'controlling asshole.'_

_Which for the record he was._

_Though she kind of found that attractive._

_You know, when the person he was trying to intimidate wasn't her._

"_I'm not going back home." Felicity said firmly as Barry held out her coat._

"_I didn't say that's where we were going."_

_Felicity sighed but pulled her jacket on, and closed her eyes, as Barry grabbed her arm, and in all of a second brought her somewhere._

"_Traitor." Felicity hissed as she opened her eyes only to find herself standing right in the middle of the sparring mats in the foundry, staring at Oliver who was leaning against her computer desk, before rounding on Oliver, "You stupid jerk, you cannot keep doing this to me, you can't make me think I have a chance only to bite my head off. I mean who the hell do you think you are? Ray is an incredible guy, he wanted to marry me, but I didn't want to marry him because of you, you stupid, big-headed, jerk. I shouldn't be waiting for you, I need to have a life, Oliver. I need more than this, I deserve better than this. I deserve better than you."_

_She knew her words were harsh, and she regretted them as soon as they left her mouth, but there was no taking them back, and it really pissed her off – not that she wasn't already completely infuriated – that Oliver was just standing there, leaning against the desk, his ankles crossed, the picture of calm._

"_Are you done?" He raised his eyebrows._

"_Am I done?" Felicity raised her eyebrows back, as her voice raised with every word, "I'm not, because you know what? I'm wrong, I don't deserve better than you, I deserve you. I deserve to be loved by you, and you deserve to have someone love you back. And just because you're too scared to be with me, doesn't mean I'm going to stop loving you, you can't force me to not feel something, and no matter how hard you try, it doesn't seem like you're capable of not loving me. So really I'm still in just as much danger except-"_

_Felicity flailed her arms for a moment, as her eyes widened considerably as Oliver crossed the room quickly, and slammed his lips against her own, before she slowly closed her eyes and relaxed into the kiss._

_Or at least however much anyone could relax in a kiss as primitive as the one they were currently sharing. His hands were tangled up tightly in her hair, holding her captive to him, her hands were fisting his shirt so tightly, that she doubted he could move even if he tried._

"_Do you understand?" He whispered breathlessly when they finally moved away._

_Her thoughts were blurry, hazy, thanks to what he had just done to her, but yes she understood, he was going to try, he wasn't making anymore promises, but this time, he was actually going to try, and she had to decide whether she wanted to take the risk or not._

"_I'm in."_

"Finley." Felicity said suddenly.

"What?"

"Finley Hope."

She couldn't remember when she had first heard the name, maybe it was one of the bullshit college courses she had taken as a minor, she couldn't remember, she just knew that in that moment, it was her baby's daughter.

It was her daughter's name.

"It means warrior." She said softly then amended, "Actually fair-haired warrior."

"Finley Hope Queen." Oliver murmured looking at the baby and then smiling, "Okay."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"So what do we do now?" Felicity asked the question she hadn't been to find an answer to for Oliver.

Oliver shrugged, "Love her, I guess."


End file.
